June | 2020 | Addams in Kyoto

Hello and welcome to Kyoto in summer – early summer, that is, so we haven’t reached the mushi mushi ‘walking puddle’ part of summer yet, but it is coming as surely as I love cats (and all animals, really). Having said all that, this means we have reached the end of May, which, as always, is the most beautiful month of the year weather-wise. Warm, mostly sunny and not humid. In terms of the continuing flower show which is Kyoto, May also brings us azaleas, irises, peonies, roses and multitude annuals which the folk of Kyoto love planting in pots at the front of their houses.

May really is the month of acceleration for all life here, not just the plant life, but also the animal life with the bird song all around us (and one bird I am yet to identify, which sounds almost exactly like the Australian Lyre bird [when it isn’t mimicking a multiplicity of other birds and any other sound it hears]).

We have had close encounters with a few of the insects at home during this time, including some wasps which we do try to avoid getting too close to. The wasps here vary in size from small bee up to the very scary giant hornets which grow up to around 5cms and can be lethal to humans. Recently they have become known as the ‘murder hornets’ in America, as they have found their way there and are causing fear not so much for the ability to kill humans (although that is also a concern) as for their delectation of eating bees.

Actually, the other encounters have been with some additional giants – the Red Helen butterfly and the Giant Japanese Dragonfly. The butterfly happened to be hanging around a plant we have next to the deck door just as I went to check on Ziggy outside. I, of course, went into a fluster rushing to get my phone to finally get a photo of it, nearly falling over in the process… Anyway, I managed to get a few photos before it flew away, which enabled me to confirm that it was, indeed, a Red Helen (which, of course, made me happy 😊). The Red Helen has a wing span of between 11 and 13cms. It really is huge.

It did not stop moving the entire time I watched it…

The next encounter was with the dragonfly, which had landed on one of the window screens of the dining room. I again rushed to get my phone for a photo, although I needn’t have because it stayed in the same position for well over an hour, including when we were getting up close to take some detail shots of it. This giant grows between 9.5 and 10cms in length.

My hand for reference

(yes, and Craig reflected in the window…)

We did have one other encounter with a giant, but this was not an insect and not at home. It occurred when we visited the Kyoto Botanical Garden, during one of our two major outings this month, both of which involved visiting gardens and taking many (many) photos of flowers 😊. The botanical garden is quite a long way away from home, but it is definitely worth the effort. It had been closed for a couple of months because of a viral epidemic you may have heard of, but it had re-opened late in May so we took the opportunity to visit, hoping to see the peonies. Unfortunately we were a little too late for them, with only a few blooms left.

That’s all there was – the last one looked like a head of lettuce!

We also had thought the hydrangeas might be well into opening, since ours at home were getting close, but that, too, was not to be, though there were some. What was fully in bloom were the roses, which I am not so much a fan of (I’m with Morticia on this one), but I have to say the collection they have there includes some colour schemes I have never seen before. The one thing I do like about some roses is the scent, but sadly we didn’t find any that had any scent at all – even what looked like Blue Moon had no scent whatsoever, unlike the bushes we had at home in Adelaide (yes, well, they are a blue/purple colour, they smell beautiful and the bushes were already there when we bought the house).

So, what giant creature(s) did we encounter there???? Tadpoles. Yes, having got off the train one station too early (Kitaoji, instead of Kitayama and I wasn’t listening carefully enough), we entered the garden through a different gate and found ourselves in a section of the garden we hadn’t seen before, which included a smallish lotus and iris pond. As a lover of both, I stopped to take photos and as I squatted to photograph a lotus I noticed some creatures swimming in the pond, which I initially mistook for fish. On second glance I realised that they were in fact huge tadpoles, significantly bigger than any I have ever seen at around 15cms in length!

I’m not sure how well you’ll be able to see them in this photo, but I can count at least 10 tadpoles.

Having investigated this oddity using the electronic oracle, I have come to the conclusion they (and there were dozens of them) were American bullfrog tadpoles. Apparently they were deliberately imported to Japan decades ago. Interestingly, they stay in the tadpole phase for around three years (or sometimes more), only growing legs towards the end of this period. I did see some with back legs, but none I saw had visible front legs. I have no idea what will happen to them once they become frogs – though there are plenty of wet areas, both small lakes and creeks within the garden area. I imagine it will get quite noisy once they reach this stage.

Some of the other wet areas

The other botanical visit was a return visit to the Heian Jingu shrine garden, to see the irises in bloom. We have previously been there to see the Dutch irises, but never the bearded irises, and I have to say it was magical. I literally took in a breath when we came to the pond where thousands of these irises are planted. It was possibly the most beautiful sight (in terms of flowers) I have ever seen, but then irises are my favourite flowers (my wedding bouquet consisted of just irises). Looking at the photos I took, they don’t really do it justice, and there definitely aren’t enough superlatives. I could have sat there for hours just taking it in, but the two benches were occupied and I think Craig wouldn’t have quite appreciated it in the same way. So, we continued on through the gardens and appreciated the silence and lack of other people there. I can tell you I kept feeling a strong pull to go back there, though.

ducks instead of people

Feeding the carp and turtles…the carp are bullies!

The bridge walkway empty – a very rare sight.

After we left Heian, we walked up to a vegan restaurant called Café Ren, about 2kms away. We went through the back streets, which is nearly always more interesting, and this path took us through a very upmarket area (many BMWs and Mercedes, etc, in driveways). The houses were mostly amazing and it certainly was a very pleasant half hour walk. The other amazing thing is we passed a business that produces headstones and other items for temples and cemeteries and lo and behold out the front was a small granite Ojizousan, which I had been looking to buy for our backyard for many months – and there it was. It was exactly what I had been looking for, better in fact, because it was a carved stone jizou, and it was affordable. So, now I have Ojizousan residing amongst the bamboo in our Zen garden.

Ojizousan

In residence

During this period of ‘iso’ (Australian vernacular for isolation…apparently) we have been making an effort to visit one restaurant per week for lunch (both take-out and eat-in more recently), in part to keep making contact with the owners we know and also to help support their businesses during this difficult time. We need them as much as they need us, so it is important to try to ensure their continued existence. We are a community of fairly like minded people and the ones we know personally are very supportive of us.

Take-out from Padma (finally)

Eat-in at Muku

Eat-in at Towzen (ramen and eggplant sushi)

Eat-in at Cafe Ren

One last item before I sign off – recently our doorbell rang and Craig answered it to find one of our neighbours outside, a member of the Takeuchi family. They are the family who run the pottery across the road from us and we often see them as they move between their homes, the pottery and the kiln building. We are following the man who came to the door on Instagram and he puts up frequent posts about the items he is making. A recent post had a selection of four small sake cups which he had just made as a test run, and was asking which of the colour schemes he was testing people liked the most.

I responded and said that I liked the green and purple colour scheme (anyone surprised???). Anyway, when Craig answered the door he handed Craig one of these sake cups, in the scheme I liked. He said it had a fault on it, but he thought I would like it. As you can imagine, I was stunned to receive this gift. BTW, the fault is a small run of one of the colours, hardly noticeable, but not perfect for sale. Yet again I am touched by the generosity of spirit that so many Japanese have. He also gave us a Maneki Neko house warming gift that he made (and which is very expensive to buy) when we opened, so I made sure I gave him a gift this time. He subsequently posted a photo of it on Instagram saying he will look after it. Lovely.